Posts Tagged ‘paranormal erotic romance’

In Bonds of the Earth is the new paranormal erotic romance by Janine Ashbless, and is the second in the Book of the Watchers trilogy.

“Broad at the shoulders and lean at the hips, six foot-and-then-something of ropey muscle, he looks like a Spartan god who got lost in a thrift store. He moves like ink through water. And his eyes, when you get a good look at them, are silver. Not gray. Silver. You might take their inhuman shine for fancy contact lenses. You’d be wrong.”

Janine Ashbless is back with the second in her Book of the Watchers trilogy, In Bonds of the Earth.

Milja Patek’s bloodline were sworn to guard the fallen angel imprisoned beneath their family church, until Milja fell in love and set him free. Now she has to learn to navigate her new life as wife and plaything to Azazel.

Angel or demon, protector or tyrant, right or wrong, Everything Milja once knew has been flipped upside down and all she can do is follow her heart, even if that means waging war against Heaven and releasing the rest of the fallen.

Unafraid to tackle the more complex issues surrounding good and evil in mainstream religion, Janine has created a thought-provoking and immersive novel which sets a new standard for paranormal erotic romance. The first in the series, Cover Him With Darkness, was released in 2014 by Cleis Press and received outstanding reviews.

In Bonds of the Earth is published by Sinful Press and is due for release on March 1st, 2017.

When Milja Petak released the fallen angel Azazel from five thousand years of imprisonment, she did it out of love and pity. She found herself in a passionate sexual relationship beyond her imagining and control – the beloved plaything of a dark and furious demon who takes what he wants, when he wants, and submits to no restraint. But what she hasn’t bargained on is being drawn into his plan to free all his incarcerated brothers and wage a war against the Powers of Heaven.

As Azazel drags Milja across the globe in search of his fellow rebel angels, Milja fights to hold her own in a situation where every decision has dire consequences. Pursued by the loyal Archangels, she is forced to make alliances with those she cannot trust: the mysterious Roshana Veisi, who has designs of her own upon Azazel; and Egan Kansky, special forces agent of the Vatican – the man who once saved then betrayed her, who loves her, and who will do anything he can to imprison Azazel for all eternity.

Torn every way by love, by conflicting loyalties and by her own passions, Milja finds that she too is changing – and that she must do things she could not previously have dreamt of in order to save those who matter to her.

In Bonds of the Earth is the second in the Book of the Watchers trilogy and the sequel to Cover Him With Darkness.

******

Excerpt from In Bonds of the Earth:

I was giving my long-dreaded presentation on the anniversary footbridge to Misters Ellis, Singh, Constanzo and Mackenzie…when Azazel walked in.

Oh hell.

“Excuse me, gentlemen,” I said loudly, lurching around from behind my desk, grabbing Azazel’s arm and spinning him back to face the door. “Not here, come on, please,” I implored through clenched teeth.

If there was one thing I’d learned by then, it was to not ignore warning dreams. If I’d paid them more attention from the start, things between me and Egan might have gone very differently back in Montenegro…

No, better not to think of Egan, not when Azazel was around. One guy at a time was quite enough to wrap my head around. Especially this guy.

He humored me though, this time, letting me pull him out of the meeting room and through the open plan office without resistance. We attracted a lot of stares, but there was nothing I could do about that except hold my head high.

“Where are we going?” he asked.

“Out. Anywhere.”

“You’re so impetuous.”

I didn’t need to glance up at his wicked smirk. I could feel it burning its way into my breast.

Bryce, the beardy guy in my new team who’d shown me the ropes of the job and seemed just a tiny bit too eager to talk every morning, stood up from his cubicle to intercept us. “Milja, is everything okay?”

Sometimes it was hard to remember that he’d risked everything to save me.

We reached the doors at the end of the room and I pushed through, past the lobby with the elevators and into the concrete stairwell of the emergency stairs beyond. The only people who came here were smokers on their way to the roof, and it looked empty for now. My panicky momentum fizzled away and I swung to face him.

“What are you doing here?”

“What do you think?” he countered, taking my face in his hands.

“Azazel—” But he cut off my protests with his hungry kiss; a kiss that lanced through me all the way to my core. I gave up resisting, and speaking, and almost breathing, as his lust rolled over me in a hot wet wave. I slid my hands around his neck and tangled my fingers in his messy hair, pulling myself into his embrace. His body was hard as rock, his hands heavy on my waist and hips. The yearning for his touch that smoldered in my flesh day and night woke to a roaring heat.

I’d missed him. His skin, his smile, the peppery scent and salt taste of him. The sweetness of his lips and the harsh rasp of his stubbled chin. I’d missed him so much. Like an addict missing her hit.

*****

Author bio:

Janine Ashbless is a writer of fantasy erotica and steamy romantic adventure. She likes to write about magic and myth and mystery, dangerous power dynamics, borderline terror, and the not-quite-human.

Buyer beware! If you like dark romance and a hard-won Happily Ever After, try “Cover Him with Darkness,” “Heart of Flame,” or “The King’s Viper.” If you prefer challenging erotica, go for “Red Grow the Roses” or “Named and Shamed” instead. All her other books lie somewhere on the spectrum between.

Janine has been seeing her books in print ever since 2000. She’s also had numerous short stories published by Black Lace, Nexus, Cleis Press, Ravenous Romance, Harlequin Spice, Storm Moon, Xcite, Mischief Books, and Ellora’s Cave among others. She is co-editor of the nerd erotica anthology ‘Geek Love’.

Born in Wales, Janine now lives in the North of England with her husband and two rescued greyhounds. She has worked as a cleaner, library assistant, computer programmer, local government tree officer, and – for five years of muddy feet and shouting – as a full-time costumed Viking. Janine loves goatee beards, ancient ruins, minotaurs, trees, mummies, having her cake and eating it, and holidaying in countries with really bad public sewerage.

Her work has been described as:

“Hardcore and literate” (Madeline Moore) and “Vivid and tempestuous and dangerous, and bursting with sacrifice, death and love.” (Portia Da Costa)

Since The Psychology of Dreams finished last week, (If you missed it, you can read it in its entirety by following the link.) I’ve decided it’s time to do something completely different on A Hopeful Romantic, so hold on to your hats. I’m beginning a new series of weekend blogs that I’m calling My Weekend Shameless Selfies. They will feature a bad selfie or photo of me, more than likely doing silly things, along with an excerpt from one of my back catalogue novels or novellas that’s somehow connected with the selfie.

This Sunday I’m talking boots, Kinky Boots. Okay, so I get it, my scruffy sweaty walking boots are not exactly Kinky Boots, but they were definitely in part the boots that inspired my novella, Kinky Boots, and let’s face it, I do get a lot of my inspiration while traipsing the countryside in a pair of walking boots, so that being said, my walking boots can be pretty kinky at times.

Enjoy the first chapter of Kinky Boots.

Kinky Boots Blurb:

After a sizzling encounter in KINKY BOOTS, a quirky all-night shoe store, with the store’s hot owner, FINN MASTERS, JILL HART walks away in the most gorgeous boots ever. Her new boots come with an unexpected bonus, a sexy demon named ELEANOR, who’s looking for a good time. All she lacks is a body, and Jill’s will do nicely.

Jill quits her dead-end job and, not knowing what’s come over her stops by the nearest pub intent on doing tequila shots until she falls off the stool. Instead she does FINN MASTERS in the beer garden, unwittingly participating in her first ever threesome. The boots were the bait, the timing was right and Eleanor has new digs. It’s Finn job to prevent Eleanor’s misbehaving. His failure means he’ll have to ride shotgun and do damage control until Eleanor moves out at the next full moon.

With Eleanor in residence, Jill’s bolder, sexier, willing to take risks. But is she a whole new Jill, or is it just demon courage? And how will Finn feel about her when she’s just plain Jill again? Will the maddeningly magical ménage make Jill’s dreams come true, or will it break her heart?

Kinky Boots Chapter 1

A girls’ night out with Vivie usually ended up a solo act for Jill. It always started out with the best intentions, but then Vivie would hook up with someone hot, shag his brains out and call Jill all apologetic the next morning, or whenever the hangover wore off. Every time Jill promised herself she wouldn’t let it happen again. But she could never say no to Vivie.

This time they’d gotten separated at the Bluu Bar just off Hoxton Square. Jill figured Vivie and tall-dark-and-dressed-for-success — who had at least been polite enough to buy them both a drink before he whisked Vivie away — were probably occupying one of the benches in the square having a good grope. From there they would graduate to his flat or hers, possibly even the nearest alley if they couldn’t wait that long. Vivie was a bit of an exhibitionist. Crowded into a standing-room-only corner next to the bar, Jill finished her wine then texted Vivie that she was going out for some air.

It wasn’t supposed to be a late night. Her twat of a boss had informed her an hour before quitting time that he needed her to work tomorrow. More like he needed her to do his work tomorrow. He’d been sniffing around the new receptionist every chance he got. It didn’t take a genius to figure their habitual two-hour lunch breaks had nothing to do with business or lunch. He boned the pert-titted receptionist, and Jill got fucked.

Still, she was in Shorditch on a Friday night. If she were going to end up alone, she couldn’t think of any place she’d rather be. It was easy to get caught up in the excitement along the streets lined with bars and clubs and interesting shops. She loved the higgledy-piggledy architecture that often involved glass and steel in the personal space of very accommodating Victorian brick and stone which had already gone through who knew how many marriages of convenience before. All around the concrete ugliness of the sixties groped and nuzzled solicitously at streets that could have come straight from a Sherlock Holms novel. It was a great patchwork of a place, heaving with frenetic humanity all bound and determined to enjoy the hell out of every last drunken, chaotic, celebratory second of the weekend. She was jostled by the enthusiastic spill-over of people with drinks and fags in front of Juno. A hen party pushed past into an off-license. People on the busy pavements crowded onto the narrow side streets impeding the odd taxi or limo. Jill hadn’t walked terribly far before she realized two things; her feet were killing her in the suicide shoes she’d borrowed at Vivie’s insistence, and she was feeling very disoriented, not entirely sure where she was. She blinked and looked around to find herself wandering along Shorditch High Street.

She half stepped and was half shoved into the entryway of a shop to avoid a handful of blokes in Chelsea football jerseys ambling by laughing drunkenly. As she leaned against the rough brick to slip out of the murderous shoes and wriggle her brutalised toes against the paving tiles, the irony wasn’t lost on her that she found herself standing in front of a shoe store. Kinky Boots the softly back-lit sign informed her in elegant gothic script. Underneath in smaller letters it read, Wicked Vintage Shoes. In spite of the late hour, the place was open.

She hadn’t planned to go in. But when she leaned against the door, balancing herself to slip back into the vicious bite of the red stilettoes, it swung open wide. Quickly she straightened herself and glanced around to make sure no one had noticed her less than elegant move. Then there was nothing to do but act like she intended to come right on in. And the thought of a cheap pair of comfy shoes to walk back home in sound like a pretty good idea.

The shop smelled deliciously of well-worn leather and shoe polish with a base note of strong coffee. Immediately she found herself nose to toe with a row of vintage-looking kitten heels flanked by a sexy display of thigh-high boots ranging in style from BDSM du jour to Goth on steroids to sassy sex goddess. She would be the first to admit that fashion was not her forte. But it was very much Vivie’s, thus the enforced suffering of her aching feet.

‘May I help you?’

She looked up to meet the questioning gaze of the store clerk, and couldn’t hold back a little yelp at his unexpected nearness. He glanced at the killer heels, which she still held in one hand, then down at her feet and offered a knowing smile.

‘Just thought I’d stop in for a look.’

She tried to slip gracefully back into the shoes, but he took them from her hand. ‘Leave them off.’ The slight gruffness of his voice was deliciously tactile, rubbing up against her like raw silk. ‘I can see your poor feet need a break.’ He motioned for her to follow him into the bowels of the store right in deep between the high racks of shoes and boots and sandals and mules and old and new and quirky and just plain strange. And in the midst of all the funky, freaky, fantastic footwear, there wasn’t a single pair of trainers or Uggs or Crocks to be found. He guided her to sit in a Queen Anne chair upholstered in pale blue chintz.

‘Are you alright?’ He knelt in front of her and sat the shoes down next to the chair.

‘I’m fine,’ she said. Then she offered a nervous laugh ‘Other than my feet.’

He settled back onto his heels. ‘When women come in here alone at this hour, they’ve usually come over from Juno or the Office after an argument with their bloke. Of course there are a fair few who’ve simply had enough dancing the night away in ill-fitting shoes.’ He offered her a smile that made her feel warm down low in her belly. ‘There’s a reason I keep my shop open after hours on weekends.’ He nodded down at her aching feet.

‘It was a girls’ night out,’ she said. ‘That’s why I’m alone, I mean. We got separated.’ He didn’t need to know that her friend was getting shagged and she wasn’t. ‘These aren’t even my shoes. I borrowed them from my friend Vivie’ She nodded down to the little red feet killers. ‘Well, she insisted, actually. And the skirt too.’ She felt stupid for telling him that. Could she make it any more obvious that she was clueless when it came to fashion and dressing to impress the opposite sex?

He glanced fleetingly at the skirt, and she was suddenly aware of just how short it was, and just how much he could see from his position if he really tried. ‘The skirt, I like,’ he said. ‘However, wearing another person’s shoes is not a safe thing to do.’ The lines of his face hardened. His lips were suddenly set tight as though he were warning her about a serial killer on the loose. When he smiled up at her, his eyes reminded her of the sea that lapped at the cliffs around Tintagel neither blue, nor grey, nor green, none of those colours, yet all of those colours.

The clerk lifted her right foot into his hand. She tried to squirm away but he held her firmly flashing her a concerned glance from under a drawn brow. ‘You could have seriously injured your feet walking around Shorditch at night in someone else’s shoes.’

The skirt she wore was a denim mini, and the way he sat between her legs made her feel exposed, vulnerable, and something a lot more yummy. As he ran his thumbs up her instep and over the pad of her foot, she shifted in the chair sliding down to accommodate his inspection.

‘Shoes are so important. They protect our feet, our soles, the only part of us that regularly contacts the earth. They allow us that intimate connection with our planet while at the same time keeping us safe from it.’ He continued his inspection of her feet, hands moving gently over her arch to the ball then to her toes as he cupped her heel in a warm hand. ‘No two people’s soles contact the earth in the same way.’

Her pulse thudded at the enthusiasm of his little speech which, along with his gentle inspection of her feet, felt shockingly intimate, even more so than if he had actually peeked up her skirt. His actions were having a cumulative effect low between her hip bones. ‘Maybe you could sell me something a little more suited to me.’ Her words rushed out breathless and unsteady.

He placed both hands on his thighs and looked up at her. ‘Did you have a pair in mind?’

She gave a quick glance around the store, and her eyes lit on a pair of mauve boots that came up just over the ankle, low on the calf. They sported delicate kitten heels and were threaded with sage green laces that looked more like ribbons, ‘How about those,’ she said. Then she blushed fiercely. They were lovely, elegant, and any idiot could see, totally not suited for someone like her. ‘Or maybe something a little more practical.’ She avoided his gaze. ‘A little less flashy.’

Ignoring her second thoughts, he stood and walked to the rack. She couldn’t keep from noticing how nicely his butt filled out his jeans. She could imagine that arse had sold more than a few pairs of shoes to women who liked a good view. It was then she realized he had taken the boots straight off the display. ‘I’m hard to fit,’ she said as he knelt in front of her and unlaced one boot.

‘Trust me–’ he smiled up at her, opened the boot and offered it to her like Cinderella’s Prince Charming ‘– I can fit you just fine.’

Everything in her went warm and liquid. Her breath caught at the feel of the leather as he guided the boot up over her heel. ‘I’ve never felt anything so soft,’ she said. ‘And they’re so pretty.’

‘Shoes should be a sensual experience,’ he said moving his large hands up to cup her calf while he settled the boot into place. Then his agile fingers began to work the laces, plucking at them, caressing them, stroking them almost as though he were making music on them, like they were some exotic stringed instrument of leather and lace. And though she couldn’t quite hear the melody, she felt the reverberation of his plucking and threading beneath the hem of the short skirt and all the way up into the moistening crotch of her panties.

‘Nice, huh?’

It took her a second to realise he was responding to her response. God, was she actually moaning? And please, surely she wasn’t grinding her bottom against the chintz. The blush flashed hot across her chest, but then instead of heading for her face, it headed south, settling against her clit with a heated, unexpected nip. And her moan became a yelp, just a tiny one, but a yelp nonetheless. She would have apologized, she would have died of embarrassment and fallen completely through the chair, but he was already working on the other boot, strategically sitting between her legs, breath slightly accelerated, and … Surely she was mistaken. But as he shifted to cup her calf and smooth the second boot against her leg, there was no disguising the hard-on growing inside the front of his jeans.

Her pussy clenched in appreciation. It felt heavy and pouting as though it were begging for his attention from where it nestled just barely covered by a scrap of denim and a bit of satin. ‘You like your work,’ she managed, not actually looking at his crotch, but not actually looking away from it either.

‘Very much,’ he said, working the laces through his nimble fingers, making no attempt to hide his boner.

Was it her imagination or could she actually smell him now? It was not deodorant, not soap, that she smelled but maleness. It was like baked bread and desert heat with some moist thick base note that she felt at the back of her throat rather than smelled. It made her hold her mouth slightly open to take in the fullness of his scent, like a cat taking in the scent of a rival or a possible mate.

Was it her imagination, or could she actually feel his breath against the place where her thighs rested on the chair, teasing just at the edge of her skirt. The growing dampness she now felt in her knickers was definitely not her imagination.

For a moment she closed her eyes, shutting out the precision movements of his fingers and the view of his body hunched almost protectively between her legs. Then she allowed herself to take in the picture of him that her other senses were painting so exquisitely. She heard the catch and slide of his breath, felt the velvet flutter of it raising goose flesh on the soft skin of her inner thighs. She inhaled the complex olfactory portrait of him, the scent emanating from his arm pits, his pulse points and the place where his cock strained in its tight confinement. She could feel his skin on hers as his fingers brushed her calf. It all created a picture of him almost as vivid as the one she had seen.

She opened her eyes just in time to watch him carefully, precisely, rhythmically tie the bow in the lace of the second boot. And as he tugged the looped ends snug against the knot, she felt a ripple up both legs that accelerated and intensified as it raced up between her thighs. It continued along her spine flashing red hot behind her eyes, leaving a plum coloured after-image of the clerk’s engrossed face.

She yelped and jerked in the chair, and the vertebrae in her neck pop. ‘Did you feel that?’ She was a hairs breadth away from tumbling into orgasm, and the man had done nothing more than lace her boots. He nodded, holding her gaze. His pupils were dilated, his breathing was fast. For a second neither of them moved. Time itself didn’t even move, like everything was holding its breath, like everything was waiting, just barely able to contain the anticipation, the excitement.

Then the world exploded back into real time, and she shoved her way out of the chair and onto the clerk who was still settled on his knees between her legs. He tumbled backward against the floor with a guttural sound somewhere between a groan and a growl just managing to adjust his position as she ground her way onto his lap, straddling his groin. The skirt had ridden up over her hips, and the crotch of her panties was the only thing preventing her wet pussy from making a sticky trail over the tell-tale bulge in his jeans.

Before he could say anything, she took his mouth in a clash of lips and teeth and tongue. He was more than accommodating, tongue darting, lips tugging in an effort that quickly escaped the confines of her mouth to nibble down over her jaw and wage a humid, ticklish assault on her nape, every nip of which she felt between her legs. He made quick work of her buttons, then shoved her blouse open and slid a bra strap aside to lift her right breast free to his cupping and kneading, free to be ravaged by his very expressive mouth. ‘I shouldn’t be doing this,’ he whispered against her breast. ‘Not during working hours.’

‘But I need to come,’ she said, then gasped and shuddered as he bit her nipple. ‘I’ll never make it back home like this. Don’t force me to diddle myself in an alley’

‘I’m supposed to be selling shoes, not fucking my customers.’

‘You are selling shoes.’ She wriggled her toes in her boots. ‘See. And who says we have to fuck?’

He offered a wicked chuckle, then rolled with her, and when he was on top, he lifted her legs around his hips so that his still-clothed erection raked between her still- pantied pussy lips. ‘You’re absolutely right. We don’t have to fuck,’ he said, looking down at her with his ocean changeable eyes. ‘I always try to satisfy my customers.’ Then he shifted his hips until his girth ploughed a trough right in between the spread of her labia, pressing her panties tight into her wet folds, the fabric binding with a little hitch right against the swell of her clit as he ground and thrust.

She scrambled to meet him with her own thrust upward, and when she did so, when her hips were off the floor, he slipped both hands into the legs of her panties from behind and grabbed her bum cheeks in kneading fistfuls. His thumbs alternately slid teasingly over the puckered clench and release of her anus.

She dug her booted heels in just above the waste of his jeans for a better grip.

His whole body was tight, ridged, like it might shatter with the next thrust. The tighter his body became, the more liquid hers became until she feared the imminent flood would dissolve her into nothing more than a tidal pool of wet, simmering girl juice.

Each time he thrust she raised her legs a little higher, like she was climbing his body. Each time she raised her legs, his grip on her arse became more possessive, more demanding. The friction was maddening down where clothing rubbed against clothing, and what was underneath felt the heat like flint and steel waiting for the spark. And when the spark came, it ignited a flash fire that left them both growling and straining like animals in rut. The orgasm that started in her cunt snaked up her spine and short circuited her brain just before it slid down all the way to the tips of her toes in her soft leather boots. Then it curled itself around her like a warm embrace and finally settled between her hipbones like something smug, like something self-assured, like something completely at home there.

After that, it all happened at once. Her Blackberry buzzed with a worried message from Vivie. Where was she? Was she alright? The phone on the counter rang and the clerk, with his now wet jeans, scrambled to answer it.

‘What do you mean Eleanor’s missing?’ He spoke in hushed tones while making an effort to straighten himself. ‘You know what night it is. You were supposed to keep an eye on her. You know how she is.’ His voice had become a hiss close to the receiver, though he forced an embarrassed smile in Jill’s direction, trying to make her feel more comfortable, no doubt.

But she didn’t feel uncomfortable. In fact, she felt rather delicious. She wasn’t sure why his obvious stress didn’t bother her. She wasn’t sure why she suddenly felt like the cat who just ate the cream. And she wasn’t sure why she wasn’t second guessing what had just happened. Instead she offered him a seductive smile, blew him an even more seductive kiss, turned in her lovely new boots and walked out the door. She didn’t know why she ignored him, when he slammed the phone down and called after her. And did she hear right? Did he actually call her Eleanor? How utterly strange?

Even though it wasn’t a long walk from Shorditch High Street to her flat, she settled herself in the back of a taxi and was still straightening and buttoning when her Blackberry buzzed again with another frantic message from Vivie. She texted back.

No worries, love! Had totally fab time, & the fun is just beginning.

J x

PS

Bought sexy new boots.

She giggled as she remembered she hadn’t paid for them. No probs. It would give her an excuse to see the yummy clerk again. And next time she would fuck him. Hard.

She signed the text E xx

Download Kinky Boots Here:

“I really enjoyed the plot of the book and how Jill not only became adventurous in the bedroom department but was more confidant too, she told people what she wanted and she got it. It was written really well and I can’t wait to read another book written by KD Grace.” 5 out of 5, Stressed Rach

“This book by K.D. Grace, whom I’m just discovering as a erotica writer and am really liking, is fabulous! It’s a quick read, spicy, and fun. Who doesn’t need a little spicy in their day?” 5 out of 5, ChantelC

“I really liked the way the story was told with Kinky Boots. Who knew that a Lust Demon would possess someone through a pair of boots. I loved how Jill and Finn got together… It was a great book and well written.” 5 out of 5, Book Crazy Reviews

“KD has a knack of pulling us right into the heart of the plot where we can hear, see and imagine the scenes before us easily. What sets Kinky Boots apart from hundreds of others is the way KD has added the sensitivity between the three of them, these scenes were not only rampant and wanting but tender and loving making the scenes between them so believable and all the more hot and sexy. It’s a fun, creative idea with a fab ending.” Midnight Boudoir

“This is the second book I have read by K.D. Grace, and it will not be my last. With a sense of enjoyment of one another for all characters, in and out of the bedroom, tenderness and some truly sensual scenes that tug at emotional heartstrings, her smooth writing brings something for every reader.” The Jeep Diva

“The settings and characters are super well developed and the sexy scenes are sizzling! This book is incredible and the plot is totally original… I loved it!! I will be reading it over and over again!” 5 out of 5, Not Now… Mommy’s Reading

“This is one sexy, sexy read. Short enough to read in one sitting but long enough to give you all the story you desire, the dynamic between all the players was fantastic and the trust that Jill gave Finn and Eleanor was well done.” Reading the Paranormal

Kathryn McCulsky is an ErGer – a rare and highly prized individual in the supernatural world.

She has spent her life running and hiding, but circumstances have changed and the only way to protect her family is to hand herself over to the Vampire Lord of London to face slavery or death.

Lucian Neben runs his London court with a stern but fair hand, but political pressures are building from both the human and fey worlds, and taking possession of an ErGer would cement his position of power.

Kathryn is vulnerable and broken almost beyond repair, but she holds in her hands the one treasure Lucian desperately wants – the possibility of home and family.

Can he teach her to open herself up; to choose to life, and him, before reality forces him to take her freedom?

Note: A Variety of Chains will be available through all main online bookstores in print and digital on the 20th of August.

*****

Excerpt:

It was inevitable where this evening was going to lead. For an ErGer to bond, the mind needed to be broken open as only sex could – and her own body would force it soon enough.

“Pick up the wine and take a sip,” he said.

“I don’t drink,” she replied.

His eyes remained expressionless, as was his voice when he spoke again. “It was not a request.”

Absolute obedience for the safety of the girls.

She reached for the glass and took a small sip. As she tried to put it back down, his hands tightened on her waist and brought her attention back to him mid-movement.

“I am thirsty, too.”

She offered him the glass, but he shook his head. “My hands are full.”

To illustrate this fact he began to trace little half circles over her belly with his thumbs. She tried to offer the glass to his lips but he shook his head again.

“Not like that.” There was a hint of amusement in his eyes and a twitch to his lips. Instead, she tried to offer her wrist, but that simply made him raise an eyebrow.

“How then?” She felt the desperation in her own voice and tried to suppress it while making the cold return.

“Take a sip and hold it in your mouth.”

She was starting to have an idea where this was leading. She tried to lean forward to feed him the wine but his hands kept her from him.

“Set down the glass first, then let me drink from your mouth.”

Carefully she put down the glass before leaning forward. In her haste and nervousness she parted her lips before touching his and spilled most of the wine down her chin and his neck. She froze in terror, aware of the strength in the hands around her waist and the sharp teeth entirely too close to her. His lips parted and his tongue snaked out to lazily lap at the liquid dripping down her lips and chin. Only when he had cleaned her thoroughly did he allow her to move back enough to meet his gaze. Her eyes fell to his mouth and the spilled wine that painted his neck and shirt red. Small droplets were still caught in the evening shadow of the beard along his cheeks.

“Clean it!”

The first flick of her tongue was tentative at best, barely a touch, but when he moved his head to allow her more access she became bolder. The taste of his skin, mixed with that of the red wine, filled her mouth – unidentifiable, subtle and strange. As her tongue reached his neck, his arousal grew impossibly large beneath her, pressing against the folds of her sex through only two layers of clothes. She shied back – feeling stupid immediately. It was inevitable where this evening was going to lead. For an ErGer to bond, the mind needed to be broken open as only sex could – and her own body would force it soon enough. In her experience, he had shown more patience than any other. Every Lord who had ever acquired her, either because her brother had sold her to them or because they had tracked her down, had taken her blood and body within minutes of their acquaintance. What was the point of delay?

*****

Author Bio:

In “real” life, I am an academic with degrees in Political Science, Economics, Philosophy and Law and an insatiable desire to confound, baffle and disconcert my students. Someone once suggested to me the reason for my stories lay in the desire to offset the tedium and rationality of academic life. He wasn’t an academic or he would have known better. It is best to use research against tedium, students to offset the rationality and an unlimited supply of stressballs for the faculty meetings. The stories? Well, they are just for me – like a mental manicure.

Looking for some hot paranormal erotica? Here’s a hot excerpt to remind you that Body Temperature & Rising, book one of the Lakeland Witches Trilogy, is now FREE to download and enjoy all through the month of February! Be sure to get yours and immerse yourself if the steamy, sizzling paranormal chills and thrills.

American transplant to the Lake District, MARIE WARREN, didn’t know she could unleash demons and enflesh ghosts until a voyeuristic encounter on the fells ends in sex with the charming ghost, ANDERSON, and night visits from a demon. To help her cope with her embarrassing and dangerous new abilities, Anderson brings her to the ELEMENTALS, a coven of witches who practice rare sex magic that temporarily allows needy ghosts access to the pleasures of the flesh.

DEACON, the demon Marie has unleashed, holds an ancient grudge against TARA STONE, coven high priestess, and will stop at nothing to destroy all she holds dear. Marie and her landlord, the reluctant young farmer, TIM MERIWETHER, are at the top of his list. Marie and Tim must learn to wield coven magic and the numinous power of their lust to stop Deacon’s bloody rampage before the coven is torn apart and more innocent people die.

Body Temperature & Rising Excerpt:

Marie cranked the water to cold and stood in the sluice of it until her teeth chattered, and still it was as though a million tiny pinpricks were alive just beneath the surface of her skin, as though Deacon were still reminding every single pore in her body how desperately she needed to come.

She was shivering uncontrollably when Anderson opened the shower door and shut off the water, ignoring the splash on his pristine white shirt. ‘It is enough, my love. I cannot allow you to catch your death.’ He bundled her into a huge blue towel and began to dry her goose fleshed skin vigorously. He tisk-tisked. ‘My dear, even I am warmer than you when I first take the flesh. This will never do.’

She tried not to writhe beneath his touch, but the misery of her need was overwhelming. Her lip trembled, and in spite of her best effort her eyes misted. ‘I wanted him, Anderson. Dear God, how could I want him?’

He lifted her open palms and placed a kiss on each where her nails had pierced her hands. ‘You have no idea what you have done, do you, my sweet Marie? Of course you wanted him. That is his magic, to make himself the most desired of all beings, to make his victims feel in their bodies hunger and lust for him like they have never imagined. Even Fiori, who is a powerful witch, not to be trifled with, gave in. But you did not. You banished him twice and remained free.’

‘Then why do I feel this way if I’m so special? I feel like I’m on fire, I feel like I’ll explode if I don’t … if I don’t get some relief. It disgusts me that it’s because of him, and yet still I want.’

‘Shhh!’ Anderson stopped her words with a light kiss. ‘My darling Marie …’ He wiped a single tear from her cheek and lifted her chin so that she met his dark gaze. ‘… There are many elements, many facets to sex magic. And that with which Deacon has afflicted you, he cannot now take back from you. It is now yours. And what is now yours, you may freely give to me, you may allow me to ease your need, as you did earlier when the situation was more desperate. In doing so, we may, together, transform it to pleasure and even something more powerful still.’ He kissed her palms again. ‘If you will permit me?’

‘Permit you? I beg you, Anderson.’

‘My love, it would never in a hundred lifetimes be necessary for you to beg love from me.’ He took her mouth deeply, tongue plundering, teeth nipping, lips insisting. He lifted her in his arms and carried her to the bedroom, where the bed had been mysteriously, perhaps magically, made up. There, he pulled back the duvet, kissing and coaxing her down onto the soft mattress.

His body was shades of silver and shadow in the moonlight, teasing her eyes with glimpses of the hard plain of his belly and the tight half domes of his buttocks. As he shrugged out of his clothes, the shape of him still remained vague and mysterious but exquisitely solid, substantial as he moved onto the bed next to her, his anxious cock leading the way. He dropped a wet, suckling kiss on each of her heavy nipples, and she arched her back and ground her arse against the clean sheets.

‘I think we must first give you some much-needed relief.’ He brushed a thumb solicitously against her bulging clitoris, and she whimpered and shifted her hips against his touch. ‘The seat of your pleasure is ripe with your desire,’ he said. ‘And I have such a fondness for ripe fruit.’ Still stroking the swell of her with his thumb, he slipped two fingers between her pouting labia and the catch of his breath mirrored hers as he gently probed and withdrew and probed again until he found her g-spot and she soaked his hand and nearly bucked off the bed.

He released a deep sigh. ‘You are as wet as the fells in heavy dew, and the feel of you makes my own need almost more than I can contain.’

‘Please,’ she moaned. ‘Please …’

He lifted her on top of him and carefully positioned her, stroking her pussy lips, then parting them. She felt the press of the head of his penis against her pout. His hands on her hips guided her downward, and she cried out at the exquisite pleasure of him pushing into her grudging tightness, then yielding, then pushing again until she had completely accommodated the fullness of his erection. And suddenly her thoughts were as filled with Anderson as her body was with his substantial cock. Then he began to move inside her, shifting his hips in such a way that with each thrust he raked against the swell of her clit, sending shock waves of delight up through her body as she thrust back.

‘I think we shall not linger long this first time,’ he gasped between barely parted lips. ‘Your need is too great, and mine is little less so. Once we have achieved some measure of relief, there will be all the time we need for pleasuring, and I think we shall need a lot.’

Happy Holidays and Welcome to the Grand Finale of the Demon Interrupted Holiday Marathon!

The Holiday Season is the season for TV and film marathons. Who doesn’t like to sit in front of the telly with a bowl of popcorn, their fave drink and totally veg out over blissful hours of telly favourites? The holidays are also the time when we love to curl up with a good read. With that in mind, I thought it was an excellent time for a marathon reading of my paranormal erotic novella, Demon Interrupted, which I wrote and ran as a serial on my blog over six months earlier this year. BUT at that time, I could only manage an episode every three weeks, so I thought it would be fun to make it more easily accessible.

For those of you who don’t know, Demon Interrupted is a Lakeland Witches spin-off story set in the fabulous landscape of the Lake District with the witches of the Elemental Coven. With the completion of Elemental Fire, I left my witches with so many stories untold, and they left me with so many mysteries I wanted to know the answer to that I felt compelled to return.

Starting today, for the next nine days I’ll be running a sizzling, chilling instalment of Demon Interrupted for your reading pleasure. Today I’d like to share with you chapter 17 of Demon Interrupted. I hope you have as much fun reading it as I had writing it. Thanks for joining for this Work in Progress. And if you want to know more about the Elemental Coven’s sexy adventures, check out the Lakeland Heatwave Trilogy:Body Temperature and Rising, Riding the Ether and Elemental Fire. Enjoy!

Chapter 17

The Remaking

Tim Meriwether and Lucia sat at the kitchen table looking out into the rose garden where Ferris sat next to Cassandra in companionable silence. ‘At least Cassandra can get him out into the fresh air and sunshine. I thought Anderson and I were going to have to drag him out kicking and screaming.’

‘He mourns his Elaine deeply,’ Lucia said. ‘I would not have thought such suffering possible in a soul rider.’

They watched the two in silence for a long moment, then Tim spoke around a mouthful of Fiori’s homemade shortbread. ‘Lucia, let me get this straight, demons can travel in time, and you went back to get Ferris?’

‘Some demons can travel in time, but not all,’ Lucia said. ‘Riders can, I can, but usually don’t. Frankly there’s little in the past that interests me. Time is much less relevant to us than it is to mortals. We simply are, wherever and whenever we are. But Ferris was summoned by a mortal, and her magic was strong enough to call him to her. It could have simply pissed him off, in which case he would have considered her fair game and ridden her soul until she was insane. But she intrigued him, and then he fell in love with her.’ She shook her head. ‘Honestly, whoever heard of a demon falling in love?’

Tim held gaze over his cup of tea. ‘Whoever heard of a demon having a daughter?’ He nodded out the window to where Cassandra and Ferris sat side by side on a stone bench.

‘Indeed,’ the demon replied.

‘And whoever heard of a demon showing compassion for another demon? Tara asked from where she stood at the counter pouring steaming water from the kettle over a cup of Fiori’s famous hot chocolate mix. She had just come in from the garden with a trug of baby carrots and ripe tomatoes along with a bunch of coriander for the aubergine curry Fiori was planning for dinner.

Lucia’s robe flamed as though it were offended ‘I was simply being practical. Not being tied to time, and letting strong emotions, in fact the strongest emotion of all control him meant that Ferris could wreak havoc in any time during history he wanted. Few beings are more dangerous than an enraged soul rider. There are consequences to such actions, and mortals – no matter how weak they are – are not to be trifled with when it comes to their survival.

Tim nodded. ‘They hung Elaine, after all.’

Lucia glared at him. ‘And you think justice was served?’

‘I didn’t say that. Farringdon sounded like he deserved what he got, but still …’

‘Any crime that was committed has surely been paid for long ago,’ Tara said, leaning against the counter with the cup steaming between her hands. ‘Elaine hung for a murder she didn’t commit and Ferris has paid a very high price for his part in Farringdon’s death.’

‘I’m not saying he hasn’t,’ Tim said. ‘I’m just agreeing with what Lucia said about only being able to push mortals so far before they push back.’

Lucia offered him a look that she might have reserved for a very stupid child, then waved a dismissing hand. ‘Be that as it may, Ferris is not exactly subject to justice as you know it, Mr. Meriwether. That being the case, I could not allow Ferris to rain down his grief and rage on untold thousands. And I needed a protector for Cassandra. I needed someone to keep her safe from Deacon. I believe it’s what you mortals call a win-win situation.’

‘And you trusted a rampaging soul rider to take care of your daughter?’ Tim raised a sceptical eyebrow.

‘The pact we made, the magic it entailed ensured that Ferris would not remember his past until that pact was fulfilled. In fact he asked to live in the moment with only the memories he needed to care for and protect Cassandra and to oversee Storm Croft and her inheritance for her. I gave him the magic he needed as he needed it. I made his life peaceful and very bland so that he would also not attract Cassandra’s attention as a succubus. But I could not keep his past from him forever. I never imagined that he would refuse his memories, that he would mentally block them when our pact was finished. But he is a soul rider, those powers are his. He simply used them on himself.’

‘The heart is a powerful thing,’ Lucia replied. ‘And if anything it’s even more powerful for demons, who must live without that organ. I cannot say whether or not he’ll heal. I can say that he would have died, and most likely everyone at Elemental Cottage as well if he had not faced his past.’

‘Are we expecting company?’ Alice came into the kitchen and stripped off her walking boots, face flushed from tromping the high fells.

‘Not that I know of,’ Tara said. ‘Why?’

‘Well, there’s a strange woman standing out in the front garden. She’s just … standing there looking sort of lost.’ Alice slipped into a pair of trainers with ragged laces. ‘I’ll go see what she wants.’

***

Ferris had always appreciated Cassandra’s ability to be comfortable with silence. She never had been much for unnecessary conversation, and he had never quite known how to make small talk. Besides all the words had been said. The memories of his past were so much sharper than he wanted them to be, and the serrated edge of them constantly cut into him like it all happened only yesterday. And really, it might as well have.

‘Lucia warned me it would be like this if I let her bring me into the future as she did,’ he said, gently squeezing Cassandra’s hand, feeling the effervescing comfort of her magic. ‘She said it was best I dealt with the grief and the pain in a normal timeline, but even she knew how I would have dealt with it after the destruction at High Moor.’ He turned to face her. ‘And I fear I would have been so much worse than Deacon ever thought of being.’

If Cassandra were shocked by his words, she didn’t show it. ‘When Anderson was lost in the Ether, and I didn’t know if I’d ever see him again, I had a focus for my rage. Goddess only knows what I would have done if I hadn’t.’

‘A focus, yes. That’s what Lucia brought when she gave you into my care. You were my soul reason for existence, caring for you and your inheritance, easing your suffering as best I could. She would have never given back my memories had she believed you hadn’t healed me’ He shook his head. ‘Oh the pain is still there as though I held Elaine’s lifeless body in my arms only yesterday, but the rage is gone. The rage couldn’t heal me, the rage could only dishonour the memory of what Elaine was to me. But caring for you, seeing how you suffered and knowing that I could do little but be there when you needed me, that was so much more important than my revenge on ignorant people who didn’t understand and had nothing to do with what happened. And now, my dear Cassandra, you’ve returned the favour.’ He leaned in and kissed her on the cheek.’

There was a soft clearing of a throat. ‘Demon, have you forgotten me already after only three hundred years?’

Ferris was certain his heart stopped. His breath stopped. Time stopped. He feared to turn, he feared that he might discover he was only dreaming or worse, that Lucia had been wrong and he was hallucinating. But the way Cassandra squeezed his hand and the catch of her breath could only mean that … Dear Goddess, let it mean … Slowly, holding his emotions in check just in case this was but a dream, he turned, and surely a vision from the Mother herself could not have been more lovely.

There she stood, between Tara and Lucia. Elaine. And still he feared he only dreamed her. ‘Ferris, you have a guest.’ Tara’s voice was laced with empathy. ‘She’s come a long way and waited a long time to be with you.’ She laid her hand gently on Elaine’s shoulder and nodded toward the bench. Still he didn’t move.

Cassandra released a sigh, then stood, kissed him on the cheek and moved to Tara’s side. And still he did not move. ‘If I’m dreaming, please don’t wake me.’ His voice cracked and he struggled to gain control, to take in the reality of the woman who stood before him.

‘No dream, Ferris,’ Tara said.

‘And no hallucination,’ Lucia added. ‘Elaine is here. She’s real, just as you said she was, just as you always knew she was.’

Elaine offered a smile bright enough to shame the sun. ‘Well, technically I’m dead, but you are a demon, my dear Ferris, and you live among ghost riders. You know that death is just an inconvenience, that there are ways of overcoming it.’ She moved forward, slowly, carefully, almost as though she feared he would bolt. She was dressed simply in a summer skirt of flowered cotton and a blue t-shirt. Her silken dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail. She sat down next to him on the bench, not taking her eyes off him, but not touching him either. ‘I summoned you once, my dear rider, and we made a bargain. You fulfilled your end of that bargain. Surely you didn’t think that I would not uphold mine.’ The sparkle in her eyes went from mischief to misty, and she swallowed emotion. ‘I have waited a very long time to fulfil my promise to you.’

In his peripheral vision, Ferris could see Tara quietly motioning the others to the house.

He reached out a hand to stroke Elaine’s cheek, and then drew it back, shyly. ‘I am sorry, my dear little witch, but I can not now easily part with Farringdon’s vessel.’

She grabbed his fingers, kissed them and pulled them back to her cheek. ‘I no longer see Patrick Farringdon, when I look at that vessel, my dear Ferris. I see the one who wore it in a heroic effort to save me, the one who wore it in a tragic effort to avenge me, the one who gave up vengeance to serve love.’ She glanced over her shoulder just as Cassandra disappeared into the house. ‘The succubus is worthy of that love, and so are you, my darling rider.’ She leaned in and brushed his lips with hers, and he pulled her to him with a sigh that was near a sob, and the heart of him was near exploding at the feel of her solid and whole and warm in his embrace again.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and spoke softly against his ear. ‘The Fire Demon has told me your plight. I came to you as soon as you were able to receive me.’

‘When you came to me at Storm Croft, you didn’t know me, nor I you.’

‘That was but a hallucination, my darling, your unconscious trying to help free you, to bring you back to me. It broke my heart to see you so.’

He had so many questions for her, so much he wanted to talk about, and yet he found himself at a loss for words. For a long time they sat silently just holding one another, then he pulled her onto his lap. ‘I can’t get close enough to you, my little witch.’

She offered a mischievous laugh and wriggled playfully against him. ‘There are ways of getting still closer, my dear rider, ways I seem to recall, in which you are quite well versed.’ She quirked her head toward Elemental Cottage. ‘And I’m sure you’ve learned many more methods of getting closer living among practitioners of sex magic, as you do.’ With her eyes locked on his, she began to slowly shift and grind her luscious bottom against him. ‘I have been waiting for the pleasure of your flesh for three hundred years, demon.’ She moved just enough that she could slide her hands down to fumble with his fly.

‘Even in this flesh?’ He caught his breath as she worried her fingers inside his boxers and stroked his erection.

‘Any flesh you wear, my demon, will service me very well. Of this I’m certain.’ With that she guided his hand up under her shirt and laid it between her breasts. ‘I am yours, demon, body and soul, just as I promised – all of my flesh, all of my heart, all that I am is yours to use as you will.

He wound a fingers in her ponytail and pulled her into a deep kiss, speaking against her lips, between hungry darts and probings of his tongue, ‘And use you, I will, my little witch. Just as I promised. Oh yes, how I shall use you.’

She shifted until she straddled him, the thin crotch of her panties unable to hold back the humid heat of her raking and sliding against his partially covered cock. ‘Don’t keep me waiting, rider, I’ve waited long enough.’ She shoved and tugged at his trousers and boxers, and he lifted his arse and nearly unseated her onto the grass, as he pushed them down until his bare butt settled onto stone. When he was free, his cock pressed at full attention between them, she stood, her eyes locked on his, and slipped out of her panties. Then she lifted her skirt, giving him an exquisite view of her tight dark curls just before her hand slid down to splay herself open for him. Then she climbed back onto his lap and sheathed him.

He sucked a harsh breath that sounded as though she had gut punched him. ‘Dear Goddess, Elaine, I can hardly contain myself in your impatience. Please, I want to make it last.’
She bit his lower lip and cupped his face in her hands so that he couldn’t look away from her. ‘I belong to you, demon. That was our bargain. And I know that it’s in your power to make it last lifetimes, but right now, I starve for you. I need you to fill me.’

In truth, he could no more refuse her now than he could all those years ago when she summoned him into the overgrown garden. His need for her was as great as hers for him, and there was no denying how that fact delighted him. Her grip on him was fierce as he clutched at her hips to push deeper into her. With a move that was like water flowing, she lifted the t-shirt off over her head so that he could see her breasts, ruby-crowned, dancing and swaying in the tight space between them. She wore no bra. Frantically she clawed open his shirt, ripping buttons off in her desperation to him, the get flesh against flesh. Then as he shrugged it off his shoulders, she wrapped her arms around his neck and tightened her grip on his cock still further. The press of her full breasts against his sharpened nipples, nearly sent him over the edge as they battled for breathing space, pressed tightly to each other, grinding and shifting until the world contracted around them. Ferris didn’t know when his demon had overwhelmed Farringdon’s vessel, but as he lowered Elaine onto the ground, it was his demon hands that cupped the rounded pillows of her bottom, and it was his demon flesh that rode her deep into the soft summer grass, thrusting his need into her with a lust that he wasn’t sure even the demon could contain.

She gasped her surprise as the rider overwhelmed the human vessel, then the gasp became a sob, her eyes wide and bright and deep enough to swallow him whole. ‘You are my demon,’ she grunted in a desperate breath. ‘You are so much larger than the vessel you wear, and I love all of you.’

‘And I love you, my little witch. You have held my essence safe in your heart for three hundred years, a burden I would have never wished upon you, and now you’ve come home to me. I am undone. I am truly undone.’

‘No my love.’ She wrapped her legs around his hips in a grip that told him she was near her release. ‘You are not undone. You are remade. And so am I.’ Then she clutched him in her orgasm with a grip so tight that he believed with all of his heart she would never let him go and, as he convulsed deep inside her, he felt as though he had come home at last and he had brought her home with him to a place where there was magic and laughter and family. His family, and now hers.